Now, with four games left this season, we still have a shot.
We've taken a step in the right direction and now we've just got to keep sticking with it here to close it out and take it one game at a time. We've lost a few games and things are no longer in our control, so we need to just focus on what we can control - the games.
The teams ahead of us - New Jersey, Philadelphia and Columbus - are all pretty good teams, so we didn't expect them to help us too much. There was a time when we did control our playoff fate, but we just let it slip a little. We can't really dwell on that now, though.
The next game is all we can think about. If we do that, we can take care of everything we need to take care of. The teams ahead of us have played really well down the stretch, but we can't forget that we have too. We're still in the mix. If you look at our team compared to other teams, we're also a little bit younger, too.
I think we have all the right pieces in here and everyone has been playing at a really high level. We're all on the same page and everyone is playing the right way. We have a lot of guys putting in a lot of hard work and showing a lot of heart during this grind.
Whether it's somebody like Hales or Weegs fighting, or someone scoring a goal, all of those pieces add up to what this team has become from the beginning of the season up until now.
We're all coming together -- this is the real deal.
As we keep moving forward, we've also just got to look back, reflect and then just worry about the things that we can work on. I mean that for both long stretches of time and even as recent as the last game. Individually, you've got to do that. The coaching staff is really good at seeing the numbers and seeing where we're at. They help us set goals and reach our expectations.
